


The Art of Bluffing

by Cousin Shelley (CousinShelley)



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Friendship/Love, Gen, Insomnia, Male-Female Friendship, Poker, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-25
Updated: 2013-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-05 05:10:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1089983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CousinShelley/pseuds/Cousin%20Shelley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hawkeye can't sleep, so a poker game makes perfect sense.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Art of Bluffing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Raven (singlecrow)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/singlecrow/gifts).



> Happy Holidays!

Sidney watched the faces around the table. This game wasn’t like most others, where everyone studied their cards like jewelers looking for the tiniest flaw in a diamond. They were usually intent on winning everything they could while stuck in a situation where losing something--innocence, a piece of themselves, a patient--was a daily certainty.

Tonight, the players had something else on their minds. Hawkeye had been suffering through another bout of his heavy-duty insomnia and slowly fraying at the edges because of it. He’d been determined to keep people at arm’s length to protect himself from the overbearing concern others tended to show at times like this. He hadn’t been drinking, and hadn’t even wanted the poker game. Those were reason enough for concern.

Hawkeye wore his pajama pants, Hawaiian shirt, robe and cowboy hat. He was in his full battle armor.

_Sigmund, I do worry when he finally takes it off for the last time and goes home, how vulnerable he’ll be, and that he might not realize it until the first punch has already been thrown._

Sidney looked at his cards again with a little grunt. “Who shuffled this hand again? Do we have an undiscovered deck-stacker in our midst who gave himself every good card and left me the dregs? Because I’d like to take him with me next time I’m playing for more than pretzels.”

Hawkeye grabbed the front of his cowboy hat and tipped it down. “I shuffled them perfectly perfect. If I knew how to stack a deck, I’d hit all the high-stakes games solo, thank you very much. For someone who’s supposed to have keen insight into people’s mental machinations, you have a lousy poker face.”

“I fold.” Sidney threw his cards down. “How do you know that my lousy poker face isn’t designed to throw all of you off guard by making you believe it’s lousy, when really I’m using reverse psychology?”

Margaret laughed. “You’ve lost every hand tonight. Not a very good endorsement for reverse psychology.”

“Touché,” Sidney said, dipping his head with a smile. Margaret wore her uniform. _Her_ battle armor.

_This is a woman, Sigmund, who can be soft and hard in all the right places, though not always at the right times._

The best description he could give the looks Margaret had been giving Hawkeye for the last two days was aggressively affectionate. Of all of Hawkeye’s friends, Margaret Houlihan was the one least likely to take his crap.

Charles threw his hand down. “I’m afraid this is too, eh, rich for me.” He snorted. “Besides, I won so many pretzels when I wiped the floor with the lot of you last time, some have gone stale. No point being greedy.” Charles grinned and gave them a salute.

Hawkeye and B.J. returned the salute, of sorts, but with only one finger instead of the two Charles used.

“Hooligans,” Charles said, but with no heat behind it. Charles waved as he left the tent. “If I am asleep by the time you retire, Colonel, please--”

“I won’t interrupt your beauty sleep, Winchester.” Colonel Potter bet two pretzels.

Hawkeye threw in his bet. “I appreciate your sacrifice, Colonel. Charles, for all his East Coast refinement and old money culture, snores like an asthmatic rhino in heat.”

Despite the dark bags under his eyes, Hawkeye’s sense of humor was wide awake. Sidney laughed. “You should spare some appreciation for B.J. considering he’s staying with me. Sorry, B.J., I don’t snore that I’m aware of, but I do have aged kidneys that pay no mind to pesky things like the solar cycle. I’ll try to be quiet during each and every trip out of doors.”

Charles and B.J. were bunking with the Colonel and Sidney in the hopes that actually leaving Hawkeye alone for a while, as he’d been bleating about for days, would let him get some sleep. Margaret had pointed out that they always tried to play poker when Sidney came through, so it would feel more normal to have the game than not. Normal was what Hawkeye needed, she’d said.

Only after Margaret refused to give in to Hawkeye’s protests did they all agree to play.

_Of all the friendships at the 4077th, Sigmund, the most dynamic and interesting one has to be the friendship between Hawkeye and Margaret. Margaret challenges him, pushes him when the rest tend to indulge him. She’d make an excellent guardian angel, because she wouldn’t hesitate to smack him in the back of the head if he even considered making a poor judgement call._

_And he’s probably the one man in the camp who can be there for Margaret in a totally platonic way, while still being attracted to her. Many men here are attracted to her, some could be there for her platonically, but no one but Hawkeye can manage both at once in the way I suspect Margaret really needs._

“I’m out.” Colonel Potter stood and stretched with a wide-mouthed yawn. “Now hear this, Pierce. If you don’t get at least six hours of solid shut-eye tonight, we’re resorting to a hammer and a knock on the head.”

Margaret threw in another pretzel. “You mean that’s been an option all along? Why did we wait?”

The Colonel left, while Hawkeye gave Margaret a mock grin and a _haha,_ and threw a handful of pretzels on top of the pile.

B.J. threw his cards down and stood. He whipped Hawkeye’s hat off and pressed an exaggerated, loud kiss to the top of Hawkeye’s head. "Sleep the sleep of the righteous, Hawk. Give up on consciousness for a while. It’s overrated.” He pushed the hat all the way down to Hawkeye’s eyebrows.

_B.J. is the best friend, replacing any best friends Hawkeye made before the war out of necessity, proximity and sheer compatibility. Trapper and Hawkeye were as close, but B.J. has a fatherliness about him that Trapper didn’t have._

_Sometimes he treats Hawkeye like I suspect he might treat his daughter Erin if she were grown. Sometimes, like he treats Peg, his wife. Other times, he’s the perfect best friend and partner in crime. Sometimes, he’s a student. Sometimes, a teacher. If they live close after the war, they’ll barbecue in each other’s backyards, attend the weddings and funerals of the other’s families, and get drunk to mourn or celebrate._

_You would think, watching them, that they had been friends since they met on a playground in primary school, either because B.J. kissed Hawkeye’s skinned knee and helped him off the ground, or because Hawkeye stole B.J.’s playground girlfriend and then discovered he liked B.J. better._

Sidney stood. “I’m coming with you, B.J. Maybe if I fall asleep early enough my kidneys will take pity and leave me alone for most of the night.” He turned his gaze on Hawkeye. “Count sheep. Count pretzels. Do whatever crazy thing you need to do to get some sleep. Tomorrow, we’ll have a conversation about all this, either way.”

“So long, Sidney. Sweet latrine-free dreams.” Hawkeye’s grin didn’t reach his eyes. Clearly, the conversation tomorrow wasn’t one he was looking forward to.

_Here’s a man who just wanted to be a country doctor, to be like his father. A good man, one the small community around him looked up to and adored. He has that here, in a way, but I’m not sure he knows it. If he did, I wonder if he would keep trying so hard to win people over?_

“That leaves you and me.” Hawkeye tossed another pretzel onto the pile and grinned toothily at Margaret. “What do you say we raise the stakes a little, now that the game’s completely private. Or we could just abandon poker altogether and do something else.”

“What did you have in mind?” Margaret’s voice suggested that she already knew, but she couldn’t help but ask.

He wiggled his eyebrows and giggled.

Margaret punched his arm. “Lech.”

“Ow, how do you punch like a linebacker with such delicate, feminine hands?” Hawkeye rubbed his arm. “Seriously, winner’s choice. Winner of this hand not only gets a pirate’s bounty worth of pretzels, but a prize of his or her choosing.”

“What if I fold now?”

“Then you’re officially and forever capitalized No Fun Whatsoever. Come on, Margaret. What do you think I’m going to choose? For you to have sex with me, gloriously naked, right there in my bunk?” He smirked and raised one eyebrow as if to say _what a silly idea I just had_.

“It wouldn’t be a complete shock.”

“You should choose a naked night with me as your prize, and it will be the best game of poker I ever lost and also won.”

Margaret eyed him for a moment, then the corners of her mouth turned up. She pushed her entire pile of pretzels toward the middle. “Winner’s choice. All in.”

He leaned forward, grinning like they were planning a conspiracy. “Is that your prize? Naked me at your beck and call until morning?”

“I’m not telling you until I win it.”

Hawkeye put his cards face down and shoved his pretzels into the pile. “Call.”

Before Margaret could show her cards, he grabbed her wrist, grinning widely. “You don’t have to win the game to have me in your bed, Margaret. You know that, right?”

“You’re exhausted. I can tell by the stupid things you’re saying.”

“Come on, Major Houlihan. Drop the military discipline for a minute and admit it. We keep dancing around each other--but Frank Burns, Margaret. You were with _Frank Burns_ , and I’m far more _everything_ than Frank Burns.”

“Why do you always say it like that--FrankBurns, as if it’s one word?” Margaret stood, dropping her cards face down on the table. “And how dare you throw Frank in my face. That was a long time ago. Things were . . . different then.”

“You loved bossing Frank around. He was just the right amount of simpering submissiveness to make you feel strong when other parts of your life were out of control.”

“Hawkeye!”

“And he was safe, because he never expected more from you than you were comfortable giving. I would have, so you wouldn’t look my way, and we’ve tiptoed around each other--”

“Stop it!” Margaret’s hands were fists at her side. “I know exactly what you’re doing, you--you smug, self-righteous _ass_. And it’s not going to work. When you’re afraid--”

“When I’m afraid of _what_?” he said, standing and leaning over Margaret a little.

“Anything! Everything! Afraid of not being able to save the next boy who shows up on your table! Of being stuck here for the best part of your life. Of never seeing your father again. Of your own thoughts and feelings. _Of being afraid_.” Her voice was softer by the end, and she reached out to take his hand.

“When you’re like this, you automatically try to push people away. You’d rather stew in your own misery than allow someone to open a window to let some fresh air in.” She squeezed his hand. “I am that fresh air, mister. You won’t push me away, so spare us both the pain of you trying.”

Hawkeye blinked slowly, squeezing her hand back. After several seconds passed, he took a deep breath and lifted their joined hands so he could kiss the back of hers.

“I believed I called your hand, Margaret.”

“Full house.”

“You win. Somehow, I think you always will.”

“Winner’s choice, Pierce.” She turned him and pushed him toward his bunk. “My choice is for you to get some sleep. So get your bony ass in bed.”

“Bony?” He let her push him, but not as fast as she was trying to go. “There may not be much to my derrière, but what’s there is surprisingly supple.”

“Thank you for that update. Down. _Now_.” She wrangled him into the bunk, and even lifted his feet, tucking them in before pulling the covers up to Hawkeye’s chin. He started to sit up, but she pushed him back down.

“Damnit, Margaret, you’re not my mother, my sister, my lover or my wife. You’re not _any_ of those things. And I wouldn’t let any of _them_ boss me around this way.”

“You would, and you’d love it. You should be grateful I’m none of those things, because I’d have resorted to the hammer approach long ago. Or tied you in the bed until you slept from sheer boredom.” Margaret snatched the cowboy hat off his head.

“Or for other things?” He wiggled his eyebrows.

Margaret sighed. “Peace and quiet, maybe.” But she couldn’t stop the smile that kept trying to form.

Hawkeye looked at her a long time, his eyelids starting to droop. “You’re going to sit there until I fall asleep, aren’t you? Staring me into submission.”

“You wanted to be alone. In Hawkeye logic, that means you don’t want to be alone. So I’m going to sit here, yes.” She slipped her hand under the edge of the covers and took his, holding it firmly, thumb brushing over the back. “But if you tell anybody I’ve gone soft and tucked you in, I’ll mix castor oil into your still.”

“ _Blasphemer_.”

“Shut up. Sleep.”

Hawkeye closed his eyes, then snapped them open seconds later. “What I said before, about how you’re not . . . any of those things? Would you hate me a little if I admitted that sometimes, I don’t even know which one I want you to be?”

Margaret put her other hand on his cheek. “No, I wouldn’t hate you at all.”

This time his eyes stayed closed, and his breathing soon shifted into the rhythm of sleep. Margaret tucked his hand back under the covers, then she softly kissed his forehead.

Margaret stared at the cards for minute, then checked Hawkeye’s. He had nothing. She could have beaten him with the pitiful pair of threes she’d been dealt. She pushed all the cards into the deck, cutting it a few times for good measure, then ate a pretzel off the top of the pile before heading for the door.

“Margaret?” Hawkeye’s eyes were barely open, but he was looking at her where she stood in the doorway.

“Yes?” She started to turn back, but he shook his head for her to stay there.

“I’ve known some wonderful women, Margaret. My mom, she was the best. A couple of aunts, friends from school, a neighbor lady who used to bake cookies for all the kids on the block. Beautiful, strong, smart, kind . . . _tough_ women.”

“Hawkeye, you need to--”

“But when anyone talks to me about how lucky they are because of a wonderful wife, or they brag on their mother or sister or friend, whenever I have reason to think about amazing women, Margaret, for the rest of my life . . . I will always see your face first.”

Margaret’s chin quivered. She smiled, her lips trembling and threatening to dissolve into something else for only a moment. She nodded and pulled herself up a little straighter with a deep breath.

“You’re damn right you will.”

They shared a smile that was reserved for them, for just this moment. One that disappeared as soon as Margaret walked out the door. She cleared her throat and wiped her eye while she marched to her tent with purpose, head held high.

Hawkeye slept until the next afternoon.


End file.
